You are only dreaming...

[DrShephard]

I had an enlightenment experience today and I thought I'd share an analogy, for better or worse as far as response goes. Delving into zen... and I suppose I'll add to it later, answering the ending question. So enjoy - or don't. I care not!

We all exist in a world where we do not know where we came from, we do not know essentially where we are except in regard to what we see around us, and where we do not know where we are going. We are first and foremost without context in life.

The morals and ethics to which so many of us subscribe are completely subjective. They do not have a relation to the universe, only to other humans. Morals would not exist if life did not exist. That is to say that the universe would not care whether a star exploded or lasted for an eternity. It would simply be an occurrence. However, morals cannot be determined from life either. Many animals eat their young naturally or live in harems or are strictly monogamous or brutally kill each other or use sex to resolve any dispute. These natural behaviors do not define universal morality, but the subjective general morality of that animal. Humans, too, are animals. If anything could be said to define what our behavior should be, it would be our nature and not an obscure and unfounded universal law.

Given the subjectivity and oddness of life and existence, if our being could be compared to anything in order to draw a conclusion, I suppose it might be a very long and somewhat consistent dream. In dreams, too, we begin by not even questioning where we arrived from, where we will ultimately end up, or where we are aside from what is immediately in front of us... or has been in front of us before.

In dreams, what appears in front of us appears completely normal no matter how abstract it is. The reality of the dream and its oddness, while not as concentrated, appears very much in our normal waking lives. Ask yourself whether you have been shocked by the oddness of seeing, in a dream, a half-elephant-half-chair creature juggling oranges with television screens in them or other such oddities. One might suggest that those are silly, and yet our reality demands us to things that do not physically exist, such as governments, and to act in accordance with others despite what strange things are believed such as obeying authority, and to take things such as gravity and electrical fields and mass and life and consciousness as normal when we have no clue why these things exist. We may be aware that they are in front of us, but we have no idea why they are there or where they came from. In a dream a river may flow upward, and in reality it may flow downward. In neither do we know why gravity does what it does, which is to say why matter tends to attract other matter toward it. The reality in a dream only seems odd afterward, when we've once again become part of the world we're familiar with. The illusion is seen once we awaken.

In a dream, all creatures and beings and matter is an expression of you. Would it be absurd to assume that this universe and all of its inhabitants are expressions of one essence - of the cosmos itself? A resounding "NO!! That's absurd! This is REALITY. You're INSANE." might be the response, but wouldn't that be the same reply from the opposition inside of a dream? Why wouldn't everything be an expression of one thing? Reality as an expression of a consciousness or subconsciousness, or of a spirit. All things appearing to be different and separate, but all expressions of the same consciousness. Despite our inability to control the things outside of us as we sometimes can in a dream, all of them being extension of who we are underneath it all? Even the dragon chasing us in our dreams is us, as is the member of the opposite sex who we kiss, as is the jerk who we get into a fight with, as are the walls and trees and floor and air.

Would it be too much to go farther and to say that we are, unknowingly, everyone around us? That we are the central being and all that we see around us are simply our creations? Just as the safari guide or superhero or insect we may find ourselves playing in the dream state is not who we really are, the person who we are in our day to day existence is not a mirror of the cosmos. Instead, we are characters brought into being and are inhabited by that ultimate consciousness. This being, (insert your name here), is a character created by the cosmos and is a residence for the cosmos' consciousness. As is everyone and, perhaps or perhaps not for the previously stated latter, the world's inanimate objects... and the world itself.

What, then, might this say about the way we live?

 

[Neuropedia]

I think this is what sartre was onto.
it's a beautiful feeling, isn't it?

 

[bickelz]

I think you've made a profound discovery. That everything is actually illogical about the way we live and how the universe works. I feel like that is why science and mathematics are both beautiful and artistic, because they are exactly the way they are because that's how it works. Things may seem logical because we perceive them to be but we may not see a different way of doing the same thing in another way at the same time.

For example, you're a doctor so I hope you went to med school. When you were there, was it all logic or was everything "just the way it is". I'm going to bet the latter. Even though many parts of the body seem logical, hell even all of them, there is always another way that it could have been.

Ordered chaos is what I like to think about it as. It's like a complex waltz where everything is in tune and time with everything else. The steps and spins seem flawless, simple and elegant from the outside but all the dance consists of is a series of illogical and unexplained steps that are the way they are because they can and because it's artistic.

 

[IndigoSensor]

I'll just answer as I go:

We all exist in a world where we do not know where we came from, we do not know essentially where we are except in regard to what we see around us, and where we do not know where we are going. We are first and foremost without context in life.

I know where I came from. I started off as a rather complex series of atoms bound together to form what is called a cell, and that came from two other individuals, and you can trace this back as far as time. That gives me context.

The morals and ethics to which so many of us subscribe are completely subjective. They do not have a relation to the universe, only to other humans.

What you said after this is true. That being said, humans are hard-wired to have morals. Is it so wrong to have our morals defined only in relation to humans, because the vast majority of these morals involve only humans? I see nothing wrong with this what so ever. There are details and fixes within this (such as exceptions) but I do not care to define them now.

One might suggest that those are silly, and yet our reality demands us to things that do not physically exist, such as governments, and to act in accordance with others despite what strange things are believed such as obeying authority, and to take things such as gravity and electrical fields and mass and life and consciousness as normal when we have no clue why these things exist.

It is true that the latter of these seem to just "be there". It's more that the laws of the universe are the "end". There is only so much simplicity that can exist. Because of this and the way humans are, we feel that there is this sense of "there has to be more to it then this". There might be, or there might not be. Nevertheless, is it safe to assume that we can simply follow these laws and figures and what not, even though they simply "exist", because it is for our own benifit. In particular with gravity and other physical laws, there is nothing we can do to change those laws.

In a dream, all creatures and beings and matter is an expression of you. Would it be absurd to assume that this universe and all of its inhabitants are expressions of one essence - of the cosmos itself? A resounding "NO!! That's absurd! This is REALITY. You're INSANE." might be the response, but wouldn't that be the same reply from the opposition inside of a dream? Why wouldn't everything be an expression of one thing? Reality as an expression of a consciousness or subconsciousness, or of a spirit. All things appearing to be different and separate, but all expressions of the same consciousness. Despite our inability to control the things outside of us as we sometimes can in a dream, all of them being extension of who we are underneath it all. Even the dragon chasing us in our dreams is us, as is the member of the opposite sex who we kiss, as is the jerk who we get into a fight with, as are the walls and trees and floor and air.

This is an interesting parallel that you draw. The way I see it, you simply do not know you are in a dream (unless you "wake up" in a dream) until the dream itself end. As such, whilw we can tell that we leave dreams when we wake up from sleeping. That being said, there is no way to know that we are currently in some other form of a dream as we speak until this ends. It is indeed possible that this is not "fully real" in a sense (for lack of a better defining term).

All that being said, it is interesting to ponder, but me? I am just going to go with it. I at least know there is an end, and up until that point and time I am going to simply obey the laws of this reality as I know them, and do what I am supposed to do within my means and just hope for the best.

 

[DrShephard]

Thanks for the replies, guys and girl! I appreciate it!

I think this is what sartre was onto.
it's a beautiful feeling, isn't it?

Next on my "To Read" list: La naus

 

[bagelriffic]

If anything could be said to define what our behavior should be, it would be our nature and not an obscure and unfounded universal law.

if the natural evolution of the mind is one of dream-state consciousness, why should it be anything other than what it is?

if the lie people live happens within the truth of existence, then the lie is the truth also.

 

[DrShephard]

if the lie people live happens within the truth of existence, then the lie is the truth also.

Bravo! ...and now I feel sick. No matter - The truth of existence at any cost!

 

[894tt3h9]

This was really interesting to me. I am going to have to read it through a couple of times while my brain stews on the ideas here. I have often thought of some of these concepts but haven't been able to verbalize them like you've done here. Very excellent. I'll be back.

 

[donkeybals]

I do find it interesting as well, and you've made some valid points. Although, the difference between real life and dreaming is life has defined rules, dreams don't.

 

[muir]

What, then, might this say about the way we live?

If everyone saw that we are all connected and of one consciouseness then people would stop treating each other like shit

The system depends on people treating each other like shit however, so the people who have a lot invested in the system do not want people thinking that way

They sculpt people's perceptions and make people believe all sorts of things....anything but connectedness. They weave false perceptions which they place over our eyes like veils

Their aim is to keep us rooted on the material plane where they can control us and the way we think and feel about things

They want to keep us distracted and enchanted and thinking only of material things: shiny, new and useless

But we can wake up from the slumber because the truth is within us:

We are the music makers,
And we are the dreamers of dreams,
Wandering by lone sea-breakers,
And sitting by desolate streams;

 

[aeon]

My sense is that the uni-verse, as we know it, is an expression of a consciousness.

Form and thing-ness, as we know them, arise from that consciousness.

And yea, Self vs. Other is an aspect of our typical awareness, but it is possible to experience the lack of such a distinction, such that oneself is all and all is oneself — non-dual — where the cessation of cause-and-effect perception also means time does not exist — there is no past, there is no future, there is only the ever-present now — there is no real language, English or otherwise, that can describe that which is ineffable, but I can try.

It is a sentence of tense, with no subject or object, as pure as can be said yet still no-thing like the experience itself:

is.

What, then, might this say about the way we live?

My sense is that humanity is doing the best it can right now, and I allow for the possibility that a change of conscious awareness could occur and change the way we live.

Right now we are living the myth of this and that, of more and less, and of value and value not. From this comes all manner of actions that cease to have meaning from the perspective of isness. That is not to say “cease to have meaning” in the sense that they don’t make sense any longer, or can be judged as “crazy,” but in the sense of the end of meaning that comes with the end of context that comes with the end of duality.


cheers,
Ian

 

[Peppermint]

I know where I came from. I started off as a rather complex series of atoms bound together to form what is called a cell, and that came from two other individuals, and you can trace this back as far as time. That gives me context.

I think he meant, that we lack the context originally, when we start our lives. That is we're not subjectively aware of any context yet. What you said is something we have to become aware of later on.

What you said after this is true. That being said, humans are hard-wired to have morals. Is it so wrong to have our morals defined only in relation to humans, because the vast majority of these morals involve only humans? I see nothing wrong with this what so ever. There are details and fixes within this (such as exceptions) but I do not care to define them now.

Somewhat unrelated(?), but I've been itching to quote this ever since I first saw it.

There is no universal moral code. There are visceral moral sentiments, which occurs when we are currently experiencing something we find either moral or immoral - one makes you feel good, the other makes you feel repulsed. There are also rational moral sentiments, which often come in the form of various utilitarian calculi - what will do the most good (ambiguous word) for the most people? Neither of these things are the same for everybody, and psychologists, neuroscientists, anthropologists and biologists have found cultural and hereditary links for the way people feel about moral issues. This doesn't suggest a universal moral code, but morality as meme.

 

[kammy]

I believe in some way that we are all from the same consciousness, and all our experiences are important whether they are considered "good" or "evil". I find it hard to empathize with serial killers, sociopaths, etc, but as the same time I understand how morals can be relaxed, and that with the right circumstances I could have been the same way. Of course I don't talk to my friends about these things, but its very interesting to read about it online.

I like the dream analogy.. my "dream" me acts like she's completely unaware of the real "me", even though I've been trying to lucid dream for 2 years now

 

[daydreamer]

Correct me if I'm wrong, I've never really seen the movie, but judging from what I read (I skimmed) it seems like this would be something in "Inception" lol.

 

[Morgain]

I sometimes spontaneously start asking myself the same things. And then I see people walking around me doing their thing and I wonder "what the hell are you doing?"

the things we do in our society often seems pointless and makes us wonder what is real and what is not
but, and I don't think we can fully imagine this, when you are really hungry, thirsty, wounded or cold to the bones, reality is pretty damn solid and in those situations their is no way to escape from it

reality ... it is such a contradiction!

 

[jimtaylor]

Very interesting points. I am at work rightn now so I don't have the time to go into a detailed response. Will later though when I get a minute. Great post though!

 

[Feelings]

[MENTION=3454]DrShephard[/MENTION] What you are saying does make sense to me. However, as I read through, I keep thinking "yeah, so what?" Aside from curiosity, there doesn't seem to be a practical use or application.

We all exist in a world where we do not know where we came from, we do not know essentially where we are except in regard to what we see around us, and where we do not know where we are going. We are first and foremost without context in life.

Fine. We don't know how the universe began, we do not know what happens after death, and that's that. So what?

The morals and ethics to which so many of us subscribe are completely subjective. They do not have a relation to the universe, only to other humans. Morals would not exist if life did not exist. That is to say that the universe would not care whether a star exploded or lasted for an eternity. It would simply be an occurrence. However, morals cannot be determined from life either. Many animals eat their young naturally or live in harems or are strictly monogamous or brutally kill each other or use sex to resolve any dispute. These natural behaviors do not define universal morality, but the subjective general morality of that animal. Humans, too, are animals. If anything could be said to define what our behavior should be, it would be our nature and not an obscure and unfounded universal law.

Yes, morals and ethics are subjective. Doesn't really matter that it's subjective though, people should still live by their own sense of values because that's just what we like to do. Take music as an example. I enjoy the kind of music that I like. It's subjective. But I'll listen to it anyways because I like it.

We might be dreaming, we might not. We'll never know until we die.

What, then, might this say about the way we live?

Absolutely nothing.

 

[DrShephard]

Oh my, oh my. The thread has been resurrected. Necromanced. Reanimated. Thanks for the comments!

Correct me if I'm wrong, I've never really seen the movie, but judging from what I read (I skimmed) it seems like this would be something in "Inception" lol.

@daydreamer

Perhaps... In the way that we can get so engrained in a partial context of our lives that we don't realize the vast context of it all - and how we define a majority of that context.

@DrShephard What you are saying does make sense to me. However, as I read through, I keep thinking "yeah, so what?" Aside from curiosity, there doesn't seem to be a practical use or application.

Fine. We don't know how the universe began, we do not know what happens after death, and that's that. So what?

Yes, morals and ethics are subjective. Doesn't really matter that it's subjective though, people should still live by their own sense of values because that's just what we like to do. Take music as an example. I enjoy the kind of music that I like. It's subjective. But I'll listen to it anyways because I like it.

We might be dreaming, we might not. We'll never know until we die.

Absolutely nothing.

@notmeganfox

I suppose I left it ambiguous to see what others interpreted it as. I like bouncing thought ideas around and off of others, because it helps me to better form my own concepts.

But I suppose I can throw out one of my interpretations of it, which goes along with several of my past responses to other threads that deal with philosophical endeavors.

Its practical use and application, as I would see it, would be in negating quite a few of the many unpleasant things we take soooooo seriously, because in the full context we have no clue whether they're important at all... and all they do is drag us down. Albert Camus mentioned, in The Myth of Sisyphus, how many intimate and personal things look absurd and devoid of meaning when seen from the outside. Things like a man arguing into a telephone inside of a booth seen by someone standing on the other corner who can't hear a word that's being said, or someone who sees two people making love (not the porn type). I'd add in other instances, such as two macho guys trying to dominate one another to show off to a girl, and the girl watching so she'll know who she's to swoon over. Such instances can leave one with the odd feeling of "Is this really all we are?" and "Is that what I do when I get caught up in it all?"

I think that, for me, one of the conclusions (perhaps the most practical one) I would draw would be that it is worth getting caught up in passionate things, exciting things, expressive things that are enjoyable for the simple fact that they are enjoyable. However, because our world and lives have such an obscure and (seemingly) irrelevant existential meaning... those things that normally tear us apart because we think they're important aren't that important at all. Life seems so very important and serious when it's "Me vs You vs The World and it's for real and it's important and it counts". If we're all different expressions of one consciousness, though, could it not be said that the differences between all of us do not fall under the concept that "One of us is right and the other is wrong, we must find out who is right and the wrong person must correct their behavior", but instead may be more along the lines of conflict being a dynamic of the world. Just as the changes in the weather are not good or evil or morally right or wrong, the things that we humans do and the things that happen are not right or wrong... they're simply things that happen. At most, we'll find them pleasant or unpleasant. When we get caught up, however, we'll start to think that they're right and wrong, and it's important that they be right, and we'll kill ourselves and our lives trying to make them right out of some principle that doesn't look at the entire picture.

Fighting for your country - as if the soil cares who lives or die. Feeling obligated to live a certain way, as if there is a way you should live. Listening to others who advocate a certain way the world should be, as if they were born with some knowledge of existence that you weren't... they weren't of course. They were born just as unknowing as you were, and are still as unknowing about the world as you are. At most, they may know a bit about what happens when you mix two chemicals together or how old a rock is or a formula on how to calculate speed concerning gravity. But nobody knows why gravity works the way it does.

As Kurt Vonnegut said in Breakfast of Champions:
"All of us were stuck to the surface of a ball, incidentally. The planet was ball-shaped. Nobody knew why we didn’t fall off, even though everybody pretended to kind of understand it."

Some people spend their lives denouncing this thing or that. We all do from time to time - I'd say it's part of our nature. But of those judgments that we feel obligated to preach that scream for condemning this or denouncing that... are they really us, or are they an image of who we think we should be? Is there a way we should be? What if they drag us down? What if we don't want to do something, but we've been taught that doing that thing is the "right thing to do". Does it really matter if we do it?

We like playing starcraft - wiping out our opponents. But we don't so much like the idea of participating in things like the crusades or all of the civil wars and rape that's going on in some African countries. One might say that one is real and the other is not. What is real? How do you know? None of us know what's real. We know it seems "real" (whatever that means). Just like how dreams seem real. Like how really well played movies seem real enough to move us to anger, tears, or other inner conflict. When they're past, we see that they were just games, and that those things are to be enjoyed. Imagine a man dying of cancer, looking up at his family who is there weeping because they know he's going to die any minute now, and instead of being there with them he asks his son to come close. His son leans forward, listening to what his father is trying so desperately to say. Something so important. And the father, with great difficulty and pain due to his disease, asks "Son... Did the senate pass the new legislation for tax brackets?" At best, it's comical. At worst, it's a complete waste of life on things that are unpleasant and don't matter. In this "ultimate" context (ultimate as far as we contextless humans concerned), I don't see a huge difference between the civil wars in Africa with their pillaging and raping... and a game of Starcraft. One just happens to be much less pleasant than the other. The same thing underlies the meaning in both of them:

- Whether they're pleasant or not.

- A lack of meaning through a lack of context... drill down to the core of why it matters and you'll find something similar to that wonderful segment of John Galt's speech in Atlas Shrugged: "Blank out."

I wrote this about a year and a half ago, when I first started stumbling onto the whole "Do these things that happen in our lives really matter" concept:

"After world war two, there were lawyers and people who dedicated their lives to bringing the Nazis to justice. They spent years compiling data and evidence for putting people in jail who they sought revenge for. They probably spent late nights doing this, agonizing over all of the information.

I wonder, if it had been me who had done that prosecuting, what I would have said as I lay dying in old age. I think it would be fake if they were to blurt out what they’d trained themselves to say – “I brought those men to justice and it was all worth it.”

I think it’s more likely that they would say “I spent my life at a table with a bunch of papers that I didn’t like. I spent all that time thinking about gas chambers and dogs and starving. I suppose if I could go back to that moment I’d go and make myself a tuna sandwich and leave all of those papers on the desk. I suppose I like tuna very much.” "

I hope that explains a little bit of how I think it's relevant to our lives. I somewhat regret throwing out my own meaning to my first obscure and esoteric post. I hope this didn't ruin it for anyone. I rather like the first post ending in an open question. I also apologize for any incomplete sentences in this - I wrote it hurriedly and didn't read back through once I finished. Incidentally, I paraphrased Albert Camus and quoted Kurt Vonnegut and Ayn Rand in this response. I rather like having those three contributing artists in my orchestra. God I type way too much.

 

[Feelings]

DrShephard's Existential Crisis

I sometimes wonder if I understand what you're trying to say. I'm not so great with reading comprehension. My nutshell summary of my interpretation of your message is "Life is short. We're all going to die, so enjoy your motherfucking life".

I think it

 

[Morgain]

"One of us is right and the other is wrong, we must find out who is right and the wrong person must correct their behavior", but instead may be more along the lines of conflict being a dynamic of the world.

I feel in my guts that this is it